April 4: Proclaiming the Lord’s Death
♫ Music:
Thursday, April 4
Proclaiming the Lord’s Death
Scriptures: 1 Corinthians 11:23-26, 29-31
For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world.
Poetry:
[The holy one called:]
by Fanny Howe
The holy one called:
“Just keep that word in your mouth.
Let the sound behind it out.”
Slippery-like. Rain loosens dirt
From nails on the crucifix
And where the rose likes the mud it lives in
Smoothing cloth and chalice
When I taste “God” I taste bread
THIS MEAL PROCLAIMS DEATH
I grew up in a church that took the Lord’s Supper monthly, the Words of Institution taken from 1 Corinthians 11:23-25 and spoken just before each congregant joined the line to walk down the aisle, there kneeling to receive the bread and wine.
In my more recent contemplation of this passage, I am struck by Paul’s next comment, missing from that liturgy of my childhood: “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes” (v. 26).
Proclaim? How can it be that eating and drinking proclaim the Lord’s death?
The term “proclaim” implies a verbal act, the use of words, not eating and drinking bread and wine. The term “proclamation,” in both English and the original Greek, has a triumphant feel to it. In English I think of the word as declaration of victory, prompting celebration. In the ancient world “proclaim” was used to announce Greek games and festivals. So, what does Paul mean when he states that embodied engagement with the Lord’s Supper, that eating and drinking proclaims– even celebrates – something as horrific as the Lord’s death?
Although awe and reverence mark the Words of Institution in my childhood memory, rebuke marks Paul’s words for the Corinthian believers in this passage. Throughout the letter Paul hints at divisions within the Body of believers based in class, ethnicity, religious background, and philosophical preference. In this particular passage, Paul addresses culturally-driven practices that reinforced socio-economic divisions in Corinthian gatherings. Believers practiced the Lord’s Supper in the context of celebratory, banquet-like assemblies that were common in that time and place, where the wealthy ate with lavish excess in the dining room and the laborer, arriving after work, had leftovers in the courtyard.
Paul counters culturally-driven excess with language intended to provoke grief and sorrow: on the night Jesus was betrayed…. body broken for you… blood shed for you… judgment… death. Paul’s words build like the strings of Arnalds’ “brot” from the album re:member; the dark, bold colors and imagery in Bonnell’s work The Dove and the Eucharist reflect Paul’s somber tone.Their banquet-like gathering were not simply a time to socialize with peers. This gathering, this meal was instead to center on the death of Jesus. When you gather, Paul says, whether Jew or Gentile, male or female, slave or free, “wait for and receive”each other (v.33) as his Body – for your gathering is to be in remembrance of Jesus, a death that brings life proclaimed when you eat and when you drink. The Body, in the earthly solidarity that embodiment brings, is to eat and drink and proclaim together.
When we take the Lord’s Supper, whether weekly, monthly, or occasionally, we together proclaim the death of our Lord Jesus as a Body with the whole of our embodied selves – with our words, sight, touch, smell, and taste. We proclaim Jesus’ death as a Body with our embodied action – taking, sipping, chewing, swallowing, and ingesting. And we proclaim Jesus’ death as “we”, not as “me.” Proclaiming the Lord’s death and receiving the life his death brings includes receiving each other as Body, with recognition that we are all in need of the life that Jesus’ body and blood brings.
Prayer:
Lord, your death brings life – this is what we proclaim when we as a Body eat the bread of your body and drink the cup of the new covenant in your blood, together. In this Lenten season, form our hearts, souls and minds in the proclamation and togetherness of remembering your death until you come again.
Amen
Lisa Igram
Dean of Student Wellness
Biola University
For more information about the artwork, music, and poetry selected for this day, we have provided resources under the “About” tab located next to the “Devotional” tab.
About the Artwork:
The Dove and the Eucharist #6, 2005-2012
Daniel Bonnell
5" x 7”
Watercolor on paper
Private Collection
This small painting is full of energy and layered symbolism – with a dove forming the chalice, the colors representing the struggle between light and darkness, and red as both the blood and the passion of Christ. Artist Daniel Bonnell says of his work: “My painting reflects on the ultimate human need to fulfill an intrinsic longing that extends from birth to death. Simply put, it is a need to be held. My art symbolically speaks to this notion, especially with darkness (black) embracing light (color), with negative space enclosing positive space, and with texture calling out to be touched....”
About the Artist:
Daniel Bonnell is an artist known throughout the United States, England, and Israel, and his work is widely used by theologians as illustrations for their writings and books. He holds a BFA from the Atlanta College of Art and an MFA from the Savannah College of Art and Design. He is not associated with any denomination, organization or institution. His work became known largely because of his solo show at Saint Paul's Cathedral in London, England, in 2004. He is author of the book Shadow Lessons; a book about the trials and lessons learned when he taught art to at-risk inner-city high school students. He is a contributing writer for ArtPulse Magazine, a magazine that reviews the work of contemporary artists around the world. Of his work, he says, “To me painting is not about what I see, it's about what I don't see.…..My interests lie within the beauty of ambiguity held within painting that pursues a sacred direction within the realm of Christology. Following the path of using a monastic discipline of Lectio Divina approach to my paintings allows a process of reading, reflecting, meditation, and transformation to occur from my creation of the work itself, to its own development and creation and back to me through a transformation or element of kenosis.”
About the Music:
“brot” from the album re:member
About the Composer and the Performer:
Icelandic composer and multi-instrumentalist Ólafur Arnalds (b. 1986) combines electronic loops and acoustic instruments to bridge ambient, pop, techno, and classical music. He sees music as a constant conversation between artist and listener and his goal is to always inspire creativity in his audience. The title of today’s track, the word “brot,” is a very evocative word in several languages, especially when considering the Eucharistic elements of Christ’s Body and Blood. It translates as “bread” in German, “violation” in Icelandic, and “broke” in Norwegian.
About the Poet:
Fanny Howe (b. 1940) is an American poet, novelist, and short story writer. She grew up in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and studied at Stanford University. Howe has received awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Poetry Foundation, and the California Council for the Arts, as well as fellowships from the Bunting Institute and the MacDowell Colony. Her Selected Poems won the 2001 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize. In 2008 she won an Award in Literature from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. She was awarded the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize in 2009, presented annually by the Poetry Foundation to a living U.S. poet whose lifetime accomplishments warrant extraordinary recognition. Howe’s collections of poetry include The Needle’s Eye (2016), Second Childhood (2014), Come and See (2011), On the Ground (2004), Gone (2003), Selected Poems (2000), Forged (1999), Q (1998), One Crossed Out (1997), O’Clock (1995), and The End (1992). “If someone is alone reading my poems, I hope it would be like reading someone’s notebook. A record. Of a place, beauty, difficulty. A familiar daily struggle,” Howe explained in a 2004 interview with the Kenyon Review. Howe taught for almost 20 years at MIT, Tufts University, and elsewhere, before taking a job at the University of California at San Diego, where she is now professor emerita.
About the Devotional Writer:
Lisa Igram
Dean of Student Wellness
Biola University
Lisa Igram’s work in higher education includes a variety of classroom-teaching and co-curricular programming experiences in the U.S. and abroad. She was recently appointed Dean of Student Wellness, where she works with a team dedicated to developing proactive and preventative strategies to support students’ holistic well-being, towards academic persistence and thriving. Lisa is currently pursuing a PhD in New Testament Studies at Aberdeen University, Scotland.